thumb|300px|Route of the England to Australia flight, starting in [[London and finishing in Adelaide (1919)]]

thumb|First Flight from England to Australia by Australians Monument in Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia

The 1919 England to Australia flight, also known as The Great Air Race, was the first ever flight from the United Kingdom to Australia. Of the six entries that started the race, the winners were South Australian brothers Ross Smith and Keith Smith, serving as pilot and co-pilot respectively. They were also accompanied by mechanics James Bennett and Wally Shiers, all of whom made the successful journey of from London to Adelaide in a modified Vickers Vimy bomber.

Although the race had finished upon reaching Australia in Darwin, an extra leg of to the Smith brothers' hometown of Adelaide was undertaken. The prize-winning Vickers Vimy aircraft is displayed in a climate-controlled museum of the same name, in Adelaide Airport.

The Competition

thumb|Ross and Keith Smith, Mascot, Sydney, 1920

In early 1919, the Commonwealth Government of Australia offered a prize of £A10,000 for the first flight from Great Britain to Australia in a British aircraft, under specific conditions. In May 1919, Billy Hughes, Prime Minister of Australia, and Senator George Pearce, Minister for Defence (Australia), in consultation with the Royal Aero Club, stated that valid aircrews must all be Australian nationals, the aircraft must have been constructed in the British Empire, and the journey must be completed within 720 consecutive hours (30 days) and be completed before midnight on 31 December 1920. The departure point must be either Hounslow Heath Aerodrome (for landplanes) or RNAS Calshot (for seaplanes and flying boats), with reporting points at Alexandria and Singapore, and final destination in the region of Darwin. Each flight was to take place under the competition rules of the Royal Aero Club, that would supervise the start, and control the competition generally.

Contestants

Sopwith Wallaby

At 11.44 a.m. on 21 October 1919, Captain George Campbell Matthews AFC as pilot, and Sergeant Thomas D. Kay as mechanic, took off from Hounslow Heath Aerodrome in a Sopwith Wallaby (G-EAKS). Bad weather caused delays at Cologne and Vienna, then they were imprisoned as suspected Bolsheviks in Yugoslavia, with further delays due to snow at Belgrade. A cracked engine cylinder at Constantinople, and bad weather at Aleppo caused more delays. Finally, on 17 April 1920, the Wallaby crashed on landing at Grokgak, on Bali. Matthews was slightly injured.

Vickers Vimy

thumb|The winning Vickers Vimy, 1919

Vickers entered a converted Vimy bomber (G-EAOU) (the registration being whimsically said to stand for "God 'elp all of us"), crewed by Captain Ross Macpherson Smith with his brother Lieutenant Keith Macpherson Smith as co-pilot and mechanics Sergeant W.H. (Wally) Shiers and Sergeant J.M. (Jim) Bennett. The Vimy left Hounslow Heath at 8.30 am on 12 November 1919. It flew via Lyon, Rome, Cairo, Damascus, Basra, Karachi, Delhi, Calcutta, Akyab, Rangoon racecourse, Singora (Songkhla) (in Siam unscheduled in heavy rain), Singapore, Batavia and Surabaya where the aircraft was bogged and had to make use of a temporary airstrip made from bamboo mats, reaching Darwin at 4.10pm on 10 December 1919. The flight distance was estimated as 17,911 kilometres (11,123 mi) and total flying time was 135 hours 55 minutes (131.8 km/h or 81.9 mph). The prize money was shared between the Smith brothers and the two mechanics, with the Smith brothers additionally receiving a knighthood for this exploit, the company presented their aircraft to the Australian government. It is now displayed at Adelaide Airport, south of the Smith brother's birthplace, Semaphore. The story is detailed in the book "Flight and Adventures of Parer and McIntosh" written by Emily Charnwood and first published in 1921. The machine is labelled PD after its sponsor, millionaire Peter Dawson, a whisky manufacturer, who financed the purchase of the machine and much of the journey. Parer later took part in a similar journey, the MacRobertson Trophy Air Race in 1934.

See also

  • MacRobertson Air Race

See: Long Flight Home by Lanie Anderson (2019)

References

Bibliography

  • Jackson, A. J. 1973. British Civil Aircraft since 1919, Volume 2. Putnam .
  • Lewis, Peter. 1970. British Racing and Record-Breaking Aircraft. Putnam
  • Sherwood, Tim. 1999. Coming in to Land: A Short History of Hounslow, Hanworth and Heston Aerodromes 1911–1946. Heritage Publications (Hounslow Library)
  • Sir Ross and Sir Keith Smith, pioneer aviators, State Library of South Australia website including personal papers of Sir Ross and Sir Keith Smith
  • The Great Air Race, Northern Territory Library online feature
  • Sir Ross Macpherson Smith bio with flight details on "Digger History"
  • Articles on the flight from "The Age" newspaper
  • Another article from seeingisbelieving.org.uk
  • [https://web.archive.org/web/20170222053121/http://afleetingpeace.org/index.php/aviators/m/9-races/53-the-greatest-air-race-england-to-australia-1919]